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Youngsters enjoy holiday music through signing | greatfallstribune.com | Great Falls Tribune
Holiday music doesn't just belong to the hearing community, and a group of students from the Montana School for the Deaf and the Blind proved that Sunday afternoon.
Through sign language, students in the school's Expressions of Silence choir were able to share a few holiday favorites such as "O Holy Night" and "Rockin' Around the Christmas Tree" with a little extra pizzazz.
"It's an important group," said co-director Jennifer Wasson. "It gives them a great sense of self worth and promotes the deaf community. And they are really ambassadors for our school."
The Expressions of Silence group is open to kids in fourth grade and on up into the transition program at MSDB. The group is made up of kids who are deaf or have partial hearing loss.
"The kids are phenomenal," Wasson said.
Wasson said the students who are deaf have to pay really close attention to what she and Dessica Wilson teach, in order to learn the beat and the signs.
"Its constant repetition," she said.
Thyra Wood, a 15-year-old MSDB student who has a partial hearing loss, took center stage for most of the performance, even doing a little jitterbug dancing and duet with one of her male counterparts on "Baby its Cold Outside."
"It gives me a chance to get in touch with theatrics and I love performing," Wood said. "It shows hearing people that hard of hearing and deaf people can perform."
Mark and Casey Rowley-Thompson brought their 9-year-old son, Gabriel, from Three Forks to attend school at MSDB this year. He is hard of hearing and they want him to learn sign language as a back-up plan.
"If he loses his hearing we didn't want him to be 18 and not be able to communicate," Casey Rowley-Thompson said.
Finding out the school had a performance group for students like Gabriel was a huge relief for them, knowing that they live three hours away and aren't able to be there every day.
And they said Gabriel enjoys the limelight a bit. He did a duet with another student to "All I Want for Christmas is my Two Front Teeth."
"He's very artsy and he likes to dance," Casey Rowley-Thompson said. "It's a good way for him to express himself."
Holiday music doesn't just belong to the hearing community, and a group of students from the Montana School for the Deaf and the Blind proved that Sunday afternoon.
Through sign language, students in the school's Expressions of Silence choir were able to share a few holiday favorites such as "O Holy Night" and "Rockin' Around the Christmas Tree" with a little extra pizzazz.
"It's an important group," said co-director Jennifer Wasson. "It gives them a great sense of self worth and promotes the deaf community. And they are really ambassadors for our school."
The Expressions of Silence group is open to kids in fourth grade and on up into the transition program at MSDB. The group is made up of kids who are deaf or have partial hearing loss.
"The kids are phenomenal," Wasson said.
Wasson said the students who are deaf have to pay really close attention to what she and Dessica Wilson teach, in order to learn the beat and the signs.
"Its constant repetition," she said.
Thyra Wood, a 15-year-old MSDB student who has a partial hearing loss, took center stage for most of the performance, even doing a little jitterbug dancing and duet with one of her male counterparts on "Baby its Cold Outside."
"It gives me a chance to get in touch with theatrics and I love performing," Wood said. "It shows hearing people that hard of hearing and deaf people can perform."
Mark and Casey Rowley-Thompson brought their 9-year-old son, Gabriel, from Three Forks to attend school at MSDB this year. He is hard of hearing and they want him to learn sign language as a back-up plan.
"If he loses his hearing we didn't want him to be 18 and not be able to communicate," Casey Rowley-Thompson said.
Finding out the school had a performance group for students like Gabriel was a huge relief for them, knowing that they live three hours away and aren't able to be there every day.
And they said Gabriel enjoys the limelight a bit. He did a duet with another student to "All I Want for Christmas is my Two Front Teeth."
"He's very artsy and he likes to dance," Casey Rowley-Thompson said. "It's a good way for him to express himself."